Lung cancer screening has been widely endorsed by the U.S. medical community as an effective way to save lives by detecting lung cancer at earlier, more treatable stages. A new study by researchers at National Jewish Health ...

Vaping is widely assumed to be safer than cigarette smoking, but scientists at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine have uncovered evidence suggesting that vaping promotes the same cellular responses found ...

In the nearly 50 years since epidemiologists first discovered Legionnaires' disease, we have learned how to test for it, treat it and prevent it. So why are people still dying from it and why are more and more people becoming ...

Globally, dementia cases are increasing at a rate of more than 20% a year. Most of these cases are in low- to middle-income countries. In a special supplement to the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease, from the International ...

Researchers at Rutgers and other institutions have discovered how muscle contraction (bronchospasm) in the airway, which cause breathing difficulty in people with asthma, occur by creating a microdevice that mimics the behavior ...

The Tennessee Valley Authority, long respected for providing good jobs and cheap electricity, is facing a growing backlash over its handling of a massive coal ash spill a decade ago, with potentially serious consequences ...

A new study of New York City firefighters has found that exposure to 9/11 World Trade Center (WTC) dust is associated with a significantly increased long-term risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD). The study, conducted by ...

The European Society of Cardiology (ESC) Guidelines on acute pulmonary embolism are published online today in European Heart Journal. They were developed in collaboration with the European Respiratory Society (ERS).

Implemented back in 2005, the lung allocation score is used to prioritize patients awaiting lung transplants in the United States. Sicker transplant candidates have a higher calculated score and are placed at the top of the ...

A study of more than 300,000 people has found that exposure to outdoor air pollution is linked to decreased lung function and an increased risk of developing chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).

People living with HIV are more likely to develop certain other health conditions over the course of their lives. A comprehensive international analysis of more than 3,000 studies on the subject of HIV, in which MedUni Vienna ...

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), also known as chronic obstructive lung disease (COLD), chronic obstructive airway disease (COAD), chronic airflow limitation (CAL) and chronic obstructive respiratory disease (CORD), is the co-occurrence of chronic bronchitis and emphysema, a pair of commonly co-existing diseases of the lungs in which the airways become narrowed. This leads to a limitation of the flow of air to and from the lungs, causing shortness of breath (dyspnea). In clinical practice, COPD is defined by its characteristically low airflow on lung function tests. In contrast to asthma, this limitation is poorly reversible and usually gets progressively worse over time. In England, an estimated 842,100 of 50 million people have a diagnosis of COPD.

COPD is caused by noxious particles or gas, most commonly from tobacco smoking, which triggers an abnormal inflammatory response in the lung.

Worldwide, COPD ranked as the sixth leading cause of death in 1990. It is projected to be the fourth leading cause of death worldwide by 2030 due to an increase in smoking rates and demographic changes in many countries. COPD is the third leading cause of death in the U.S. and the economic burden of COPD in the U.S. in 2007 was $42.6 billion in health care costs and lost productivity.

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